Dark Man
by historylover
Summary: Sam makes a realization.


A/N: Thank you for your kind reviews for "Title to Come Later." I'm glad you thought it was as funny as I thought it was. Now, for a complete change of tone…

Disclaimer: I don't own anything of value, except for my car (which is 16 years old. It's old enough to drive itself!). If you think I own Supernatural, you're very much mistaken.

**Dark Man**

Sam didn't have too many fears. Real phobias that he knew other people had. Jess had been claustrophobic, had a fear of fire. And she had a weird phobia of cream pies smashed in people's faces. (She said it was due to watching _Three's Company_ when she was a toddler. Eyes would open under the cream and all you could see was a white face and EYES.)

The only phobia Sam would own up to was his fear of clowns. A fear that Dean took a lot of advantage of when they were growing up. In fact, if Jess could blame a sitcom for her fear of cream pies, Sam knew he could blame Dean for his fear of clowns. After all, who was it who made Sam watch "It"? For a couple of Halloweens after that, Dean would randomly jump out at Sam while wearing clown makeup. Once, Sam had woke up to find that Dean had painted HIM up as a clown. It took two days to get that makeup off.

However, there was a deeper reason to Sam's fear of clowns than Dean's humor at his fear. In fact, he could admit that it was somewhat related to Jess' fear of cream pies smashed in people's faces. It was the idea of not being able to see someone's face or eyes. A clown hides in plain sight. A red smiley face can hide a broken heart.

In a way, it was related to Sam's other fear, one that he hadn't admitted to anyone except himself. Least of all Dean. Although he didn't think Dean would laugh at this fear like the fear of clowns. Instead, Dean would probably watch him, his eyes always filled with concern and love.

And Sam hated that look when it was directed at him.

It was a reason he hated Halloween. Everyone wore masks. Everyone hid in plain sight. It always struck Sam as superficial and a little creepy. And this was coming from a guy who knew about fears and things that go bump in the night.

He figured all of this was related to his fear of clowns. People who hid behind makeup. All you could see of the person was his eyes, and they always conveyed something horrible behind the "fun" makeup.

Sam's other fear was a dark man stalking him. He always knew the dark man was near. Even at college. Stalking him. Watching him. The thought scared him. An unseen man, just waiting for him beyond the shadows. Just out of sight. An evil man who was wanting to hurt Sam and people he carried about.

He would wake up at night, feeling eyes on him. Whenever he would hunt with Dean, he could feel eyes on him. When he was away from Dean, he could still feel those eyes.

When he was younger, he thought it was related to the things they hunted. He could feel something watching him from the closet, and his dad gave him a .45 to protect himself. That made him very upset with his dad.

In college, he put it down as nightmares and memories of his teenaged hunting experiences. Afterwards, he put it down as nightmares about Jess' death. When he found out about Azazel, he thought the demon was the cause of these memories.

As he was flipping through a medieval book and focused on a painting of the Devil, he thought he was feeling Lucifer circling around him, drawing closer to his vessel.

"_Are you sure that's the dark man?" _Sam heard a voice ask.

Sam looked at the painting again. The devil was a black monster with horns and a tail. _Isn't it?_

He heard Dean roll over in bed, and he watched his brother sleep. A lot had happened the past couple years. He knew Dean didn't completely trust him anymore.

He wondered how he could get Dean's trust back. Even though Dean tended to sometimes be an overgrown 9 year old, and could quickly revert to the same kid he was when he was jumping out of closets as a clown just to frighten Sam out of his skin, he no longer had a childlike trust. He was too jaded now. Too many things had happened to him. Torture. Hell. Helping Sam jumpstart the apocalypse. Even though Sam didn't blame Dean for anything that happened in Hell any longer, for some reason he couldn't find the words to tell Dean that he trusted him and loved him.

And it hurt that he couldn't tell Dean that he loved him. Sam was worried that nothing would ever be like it was again.

A passing car's headlight momentarily shone in the room, illuminating Dean. Dean rolled back over, away from the light shining on him.

Sam closed the book and turned of his reading penlight. As he stood up to go to bed, he caught a sight of the dark man, just standing watching him from the motel room's shadows.

Sam jumped back in shock and turned on the light. Dean grumbled as he sat up in bed, shielding his eyes from the light.

Sam stared at the dark man.

"I should have known," he breathed out.

"Wha?" Dean asked, trying to blink his eyes into focus in the light.

_I always thought I was so smart, _Sam thought as he looked at Dean in the light and then back to the mirror reflecting him standing in the shadows.

_I was always the evil, dark man._

A/N: Very, very short. And very rambly. I don't tend to write Sam well, although I always attempt it. I also wrote this while watching "The Blob" (the original with Steve McQueen), so I was only half paying attention to it. I'm working on something else. Against my better judgment, it may be a multichapter. Anyway, I hope you liked this one. I wrote it fast. I wrote it without really even thinking. And it probably shows.


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